'Fall of the American Empire' muddled mess

By G. Allen Johnson, Hearst Newspapers

Published
5:19 pm EDT, Thursday, July 11, 2019

A courier delivery man (Alexandre Landry) and Montreal's priciest escort (Maripier Morin) navigate a world of underworld riches in Denys Arcand's "The Fall of the American Empire." (Van Royko/Sony Pictures Classics) less

A courier delivery man (Alexandre Landry) and Montreal's priciest escort (Maripier Morin) navigate a world of underworld riches in Denys Arcand's "The Fall of the American Empire." (Van Royko/Sony Pictures ... more

Photo: Sony Pictures Classics

Photo: Sony Pictures Classics

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A courier delivery man (Alexandre Landry) and Montreal's priciest escort (Maripier Morin) navigate a world of underworld riches in Denys Arcand's "The Fall of the American Empire." (Van Royko/Sony Pictures Classics) less

A courier delivery man (Alexandre Landry) and Montreal's priciest escort (Maripier Morin) navigate a world of underworld riches in Denys Arcand's "The Fall of the American Empire." (Van Royko/Sony Pictures ... more

Photo: Sony Pictures Classics

'Fall of the American Empire' muddled mess

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Denys Arcand's "The Fall of the American Empire" is both a noirish crime film and a commentary on class and racial disparity, and it is on pretty shaky ground on both fronts.

It's about a self-pitying delivery guy with a doctorate in philosophy who runs across a crime in progress and picks up two bags of money, apparently worth millions. With both cops and bad guys on his trail, he teams with a high-end prostitute and an expert at money laundering who just did a stretch in prison to keep the money — and perhaps have it do some social good in the process.

Sounds like the foundation for a cracking good film. After all, Arcand, the legendary French Canadian Oscar winner is following Jean-Luc Godard's famous dictum, "All you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun." Throw in bags of stolen loot, and you got it made, right?

Unfortunately, "The Fall of the American Empire" has left out a fourth element: energy. The film is so stagnant that the 127-minute running time feels longer then "Avengers: Endgame." It's one of those movies where everyone delivers their lines in an understated way — no one gets excited about anything, no one raises a voice, argues with each other or gets violent, even when lives are threatened and cops are involved.

Pierre-Paul (Alexandre Landry) is the self-pitying schlub. He is white, privileged, lives in suburban Montreal and complains incessantly about how he'll never get ahead because he comes from a family that has been working-class for generations.

The first thing he does with his bag of money is hire the most expensive prostitute in Montreal, which costs him two months of his usual delivery pay. His reason, in part: She is named Aspasie (Maripier Morin) after a lover of Socrates, and has a quote from Racine on her website.

Pierre-Paul becomes aware of the money launderer, Sylvain (Rémy Girard), because he is a famous criminal known as "The Brain," and his release gets TV coverage. Why Sylvain, who says he is trying to go straight, gets involved with a mistake-prone newbie like Pierre is anyone's guess. Especially with two detectives (Maxim Roy, Louis Morissette) on Pierre's tail, and the crime boss who was victimized looking for who has his loot.

The crime boss and the two men who initially stole his loot are black. His counterpoint is a financial guru (Pierre Curzi), a former client of Aspasie's, an old white man who heads a firm that counts two former prime ministers as members.

In other words, the cops won't touch him. The white rich people always get away with crimes.

At one point, in a total non sequitur, Arcand shows us several citizens of color sitting on park benches, staring sadly into the camera. And in a most disturbing scene that plays as a near-lynching, a gang of white crooks tortures one of the black criminals (Patrick Abellard) for the money.

But when no main character in the film is a person of color, or even a person of desperate economic need, why even try to make this muddled point?

Politics and social commentary aside, we are left with a crime film. One that isn't very suspenseful or particularly clever.